Warning: this chapter contains scenes and themes that are not suitable for all audiences. If my FBI agent is watching...this is why I googled so many strange questions. It sickens me to know everything that goes behind what you all and my OCs will have to witness, so I'll try to finish this arc up to lessen the pain.

I guess it really didn't take much to get Tobias Jones to invite me to this dog fight. Even moreso, he offered to give me a ride in his old pickup truck, one that had parts of the floor missing, allowing me to see the road below us as we drove. It also didn't have a working AC. Because of that, he rolled the windows down as we drove outside of town. My arm rested on the windowsill while I looked outside, feeling my stomach clench with every bump Tobias hit on the road.

If only this place was within walking distance, I thought to myself. Sadly, nothing seemed to be within walking distance of anywhere in America, not when people drove everywhere they went.

Luckily, it wasn't as long of a drive to this place than it was to get from the airport to Tami's cousin's home. The second the truck was pulled into park, I unbuckled my seatbelt and hopped out of the car. It earned a laugh from the villain who drove me here.

"Eagah teh see the fight?" Tobias asked. "I bet a good round or two will make yuh fuhget about that bitch at home."

It was a good thing that the truck was standing between that man and me; otherwise, I don't think I could've held my fist from slamming into his jaw.

"Can you give us an idea where you're at?" Bravura's voice asked inside my ear. "The tracker we have on you is cutting in and out."

My eyes scanned the place. "So, it's in the middle of nowhere?" I asked.

Again, Tobias laughed while he walked towards the back of his truck to get some things. If I wanted to pull this act off, I knew I had to follow suit. I met him at the back where he lowered the tailgate down to reveal a good dozen crates sitting in the back, hidden under the hood.

My stomach dropped; something I wasn't expecting to happen when I saw the animals crammed into cages much smaller than they were. Back in Japan, dog fighting was legal in some areas. Not in Musutafu, but there was a small town nearby that my dad would go to. He once brought me with him on my tenth birthday. Má was horrified, but he said it was for my own good.

If I wanted to be a hero, I needed to understand how to fight, no matter how horrific it was. I didn't remember most of the fighting, just the blood that was spilt and scattered across the arena's cold hard floor. People cheered and screamed when it happened. The noise shattered through the building, even as my dad walked me out into the cold night. We didn't stay until the end, but there was one thing I noticed about my dad that night. He never seemed affected by anything that had happened.

That was when he looked at me and explained that heroes couldn't let the smallest things get to them. If I wanted to go down this path, I couldn't give into any kind of emotion, no matter how hard it was. I knew back then, I wanted to cry after seeing the dogs being treated the way that they were, but it was legal, so I guess I could see why it was all okay.

Now, I knew that wasn't the case, but like he said, I couldn't let it get to me. That was probably the only good thing that man ever taught me.

"Hasta be," Tobias explained as he pulled out two smaller cages. One filled with tiny cats whining while the other had two dogs the size of my hand jammed into it. He handed both cages towards me.

Odd. I'd thought that only dogs fighting would be used for this sort of thing, I thought to myself as I tucked the cages under one arm to take whatever other cages he had left. I couldn't voice that thought. Not when I was hoping he'd explain more as to where we were at.

"See, if the wrong kinda people get wind of this whole operation, they might wanna stop us, but it's not our fault they don't undahstand," he continued. "Theyuh just wimps. No. Yuh gotta do it wheah no fucking hero is gonna be loitering or some random person is gonna waltz in and call the authohities. If we gotta do this ina abandon barn they haven checked in wha? Twenty-thirty yeahs, then so be it. We gotta do wha's best, ya know?"

He glanced over at me as he pulled out a larger cage. "Yuh got some muscles, right? Mind taking this in? Hannibal needs a good warm-up opponent befoh I put 'im in the ring."

My head turned to look at what this so-called "opponent" was, but I don't think it was even a real animal. At least, not now. It looked like an overgrown dog with scales replacing its fur. I froze when it turned its head, showing off these red demon eyes that sunk into its eye sockets and had a mouth that was sewn shut.

"What is that thing?" I asked.

Tobias shrugged. "Dunno. Don' care. Got it off a buddy. Regardless, it's stuhdy, makin' it good endurance practice for Hannibal."

The man handed me the mutated mutt before reaching towards the back of the truck to get one last thing. As he did, the thing inside the bigger cage jerked, nearly jumping out of my hand.

What the hell is this thing?

Part of me wanted to ask again, but there was no way I was going to get an answer out of him. If I said anything else, it would've been directed to Bravura, Sicarius, or Quinn, who were all listening into the conversation. Maybe one of them would know and would explain to me what this thing was, but that would mean risking the mission.

If I wanted to stop this from happening, then I needed to focus. I looked to see the barn Tobias mentioned earlier. All that surrounded it were overgrown stalks of corn around it and a line of trees behind it.

"Back up," Tobias warned.

I took a few steps back as he pulled out a leash and yanked a dog out of the truck. It looked like any other dog as it had brown fur, a pair of floppy ears, and a short face, but its face was far from normal looking. Sticking out of its boxy mouth were two fangs that reached just below its jawline.

"He's a beauty, isn' he?" Tobais asked. "Hannibal heah is gonna make me a very rich man, just you watch."

"I think I'm going to be sick," I heard Siccarius nearly vomit on the other end of my earpiece. At least she wasn't the one seeing it. Not yet that was.

"What is that thing?" I asked.

"A mastiff. Massive thing. Surprised I could even get 'im as cheap as I did,'' the man boasted. "Now, lets get inside before weah too late."

While I nodded my head and followed him inside, I somehow knew this was the last place I wanted to be.

✧ ▬▭▬ ▬▭▬ ✦✧✦ ▬▭▬ ▬▭▬ ✧

Tobias left me alone once we walked inside, saying I should feel free to mingle with other people while he trained his "prize-winning mutt." Part of me wanted to follow, but seeing the way he opened a small box he pulled from his pocket filled with syringes and vials of murky liquid, I figured it was best not to find out what was going to happen to Hannibal or any of the small animals he had on him.

Besides, the moment I got out of ear distance, it allowed me to talk to the rest of my team. I made sure to keep my voice low in case anyone listened.

"Tell me this isn't normal," I asked as I weaved my way through people. I wasn't exactly sure where this was all going to be set up with so many people filling up the space inside, but I had a feeling I'd know soon enough.

None of them answered. No words of advice from Sicarius. No follow-up questions from Bravura. Nothing. My hand brushed over my ear to push the earpiece in closer, but I acted as if it was to adjust one of the fake earrings in my ear.

If my friend from back home, Sakura, would've caught wind of this, I was certain she'd flip. I never understood fashion as much as she did. Whether she'd be happy or upset with this particular choice was beyond me.

I was just grateful it gave me an excuse to adjust my earpiece without looking suspicious.

"Hello?" I asked.

Again, nothing. I shook my head, hoping that I could get a hold of them later, but in the meantime, there was only one thing I could do. I walked around, watching all the people around me. It wasn't the place anyone should've dared to take a little kid to, and luckily, I didn't see any. Whatever was going through my dad's mind when I was ten was beyond me.

No. It wasn't. That man always had some sort of sick sense of humor.

Most of the people around me were men. They'd drag their dogs on leashes, strike them with whips, kick them to the side, and so much worse. If I tried to tear my head away from where the dogs were, I'd find people betting on dogs, making rude comments about which mutt was going to be torn to shreds. They'd all laugh at it in the end, like it was all some sort of joke.

How did people find this fun?

"Please tell me I don't have to be here long," I whispered, hoping someone would hear me.

All I was met with was silence.

I walked over towards a barstool on the side. Most of the barn was fashioned in a way that it was open for all to move around in, but there were seats placed on the sides. The sights of what happened before these fights were already getting to me.

Just how long would it take for Bravura, Sicarius, and Lento Lure to get here? I wondered.

"First time?"

My head turned, and I instantly regretted doing so. I thought I wouldn't know a single person here. Who would I have known outside of Tobias Jones that would want to come here? Especially since I was still so new to the area?

At first glance, this man looked somewhat plain, but his brown wings gave him away. While I recognized him, he didn't seem to remember me as he tilted his head.

"Hey? You okay?" he asked in an accent I was so familiar with.

Yet, looking at him walking around, fine, after all the destruction he had done...all I could feel was my blood boil. How dare he ask that! After what he attempted at the airport. His wings were clean of any blood stains, but I remembered. I remembered exactly what he did, how those feathers flew past and pierced themselves right into Tami's skin.

He shouldn't have been able to walk away free after what he did. My fingers curled up into the palm of my hands, pressing into them so hard I could feel my fingernails creating their indents as they tried to cut through the skin.

"Do you need a drink?" he asked, standing up from the chair he was sitting in. "I can get us a drink for you to cool—"

I never let him finish his sentence. Just like how he launched himself up into the air to start that attack yesterday, I flung myself out of my chair and tackled him to the ground. He didn't have time to even react as I pushed him down, keeping my legs locked around his chest while my hands slapped into his shoulders to keep him down.

"What the hell are you doing here?" I growled in my native tongue.

His brown eyes widened. "I don't know what you're talking about—"

"Then let me say it in English, what are you doing here?" I asked again, pulling my arm back preparing to get this guy some payback for what he did.

But I never had the chance to give this guy the payback he deserved. Scaly hands wrapped around my wrist before yanking me off of this guy. The man with brown wings just stayed on the ground, wide eyed, almost as if he didn't remember what he did yesterday, as if he didn't remember me.

"Dude! Chill! What's gotten into—wha's that?" Tobias's voice asked. Before I could even get a chance to ask what he meant, I felt his hand scratch against my ear. The same ear that had the earpiece in, one that should've been hidden by the ridiculous amount of fake earrings I had worn. I turned around to try to reach for the chip, but the man with the dinosaur Quirk was too quick as he took a step back. His eyes glared at me as he did. "An earbud? Who yuh talkin' teh?"

People were so loud, I hoped people didn't hear a word he said, but I felt two different pairs of arms slip through my own before holding them back. They couldn't hold on with just their hands with how large my muscles were, but they made sure they held me in a way that I couldn't escape easily. Not without using my Quirk.

I didn't try to escape as I glared down at the man with the winged Quirk. His brown eyes were wide open as the colors drained from his face.

"Don't tell me you're with the feds," the man on the ground begged. "Please, I-I just got home."

It was at that moment I realized he had no clue who I was. He seemed to have no memory of what happened yesterday. But that was impossible. It had to be.

"I don' think so," Tobias claimed. I turned my head to see him crush the earpiece in his thick scaly hands. "I's worse. You'se a paht of some Hero Agency, a'en't you? Damn it. Afteh all the kindness I showed you. I'm gonna make you fucking pay befoah anyone else—"

His words fell on deaf ears as the windows shattered all around us. My head snapped up to see Sicarius swinging from the air all before throwing something my way. I didn't think twice as I activated my Quirk, feeling my biceps grow. The two men who were holding onto me had no choice but to let go, allowing me to grab the stick she had thrown.

Just like that, our fight against the dog fighters had begun.

Author's Note:

....

...I am not happy with the amount of information I have learned about this disgusting type of events. FBI agent, reader, if you're seeing this, I am so sorry the amount of research that I had to do and then show here in this chapter and next. It's horrifying. So let's end on a happy note, shall we?

What's everyone's favorite animal?

Character Spotlight: Tobias Jones
Quirk: Dinosaur
Likes: Gambling

Music: Tales of the Magic Tree: IV The Spider Knows His Craft by Litvinovksy